Army Apprentices Memorial

On Friday Maurice Hope sent the committee this report re progress, and he asked me to place it on the website ..... so:

Gentlemen,
The following is an update of activities so far in respect of the above project.
At our last reunion,the idea of an Army Apprentice Memorial was raised during our AGM,, and since then the project has moved along at quite a brisk pace.
During August and September,dialogue with the other three main schools Old Boys Associations took place (Chepstow,Harrogate and Carlisle),which resulted in a meeting of nominated persons from each, coming together and agreeing on a joint project to achieve the task of planning,designing,costing and erecting a joint memorial to all persons who took part in the Army Apprentice Scheme (Irrespective of the eventual Corps in which they served).
That first meeting was held at the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas on the 28th of October,at which Mr Paul Kennedy who is the British Legion curater of the site was present,and who outlined the process needed to erect a memorial ,which gave us some guidence on size,materials allowed and the basic rules that we must follow to conform to health & safety regulations,etc.

A national steering committee was elected and the following appointments were made,as can be seen Arborfield is very well represented so that our views and input is quite considerable.

Chairmen : David C Chapman (Chepstow)
Vice Chairman : Keith Thrower (Arborfield)
Honorary Secretary : Gordon G Bonner (Arborfield)
Honorary Treasurer : Mike J Davis (Arborfield)
Committee Webmaster : Max Warwick (Arborfield)

Members : Colin Weir (Chepstow)
Maurice E Hope (Arborfield)
Johnny McGahan (Harrogate)
David Cooper (Carlisle)

The following were given responsibilities as Association Representatives.

Arborfield - Maurice E Hope.
Chepstow - David C Chapman.
Harrogate - Johnny McGahan.
Carlisle - David Cooper.

The committees next meeting is to be held at the REME Museum on the 9th of December,following which I will further update you on any developments.

The task will have the project name of The Army Apprentice Memorial Project (AAMP).

Max Warwick outlined his ideas for a web site,with particular interest to providing a pen picture of all four Army Apprentices Schools,with web links to each of the Association websites. This will be shortly up and running with the domain name to be http://www.armyapprenticememorial.org.uk.

Following discussions on several ideas put forward for a memorial design, the attached provisional design was agreed upon by the committee,to be circulated to three different Stone/Memorial masons for comments and costing evaluations, any slight alterations or modifications to our design following their input I will relay to you in the next bulletin on progress. At that update hopefully I can give you some basic idea on costing for a memorial,which will not take into account costs of dedication,insurance etc, which are still some way down the line.

I have been asked by David Chapman to seek out your views and comments on our activities to date, the same is being asked of the other association committes, so be it good or bad please let me know.
It would be a good idea, I think, if Dave can do a brief for our AOBA website showing our provisional design suggestion,then at least members have an idea of what we are asking them to donate to,and may give us a wider feedback from our membership

Please let me have any feedback before the 9th of December,so that I can convey your comments to the steering committee

Regards Maurice (Mo) Hope 59b.

.........................................................

Below please see some more sketches Mo attached.

Arborfield Old Boys' Association

AAS Cap Badge

Some might recall that at the last AGM we agreed we would look into the possibility re-manufacturing the AAS cab badge. Bill Cleasby looked into the possibility and finally located the responsible company. Sadly all the tooling has been lost, but they are able to re-tool and produce an exact replica. The minimum order quantities are 300 at a cost of just short of £10.00 each.

Your committee has a mind to proceed with an initial order, but would first like to gauge interest from the Old Boys around the world. So if we are able to provide new AAS cab badges is there sufficient interest in them, or would they end up left in the store cupboard indefinitely?

Please leave a message with your thoughts - or use your vote on the forum at the AOBA Forum

Arborfield Old Boys' Association

AOBA 2010 Official Calendar

FINALLY it's available

you can download your free copy by visiting The Notice Board

As last year it's a free download, but unlike last year, if you'd like to make a donation towards the Army Apprentices Memorial Fund you can do so. Just choose your prefered method and be assured your dontation will be most welcome :lol:

My apologies for the delay in production – but I hope that won’t spoil your enjoyment.

Arborfield Old Boys' Association

We're on the move!!

Hi Guys,

You may or not know we have been experiencing quite a few problems with the host of our AOBA forum. So much so that we have decided to leave then and host our forum on our own platform.

The good news to this move is that we will gain complete control over the forum and be able to take regular back-ups ensuring our stories and histories are never lost.

The bad news is we all need to re-register on the new forum, and so I invite you to visit us in our new home at www.arborfieldoldboys.co.uk/forum where you will find the log on screen.

We have made a significant change in the registration process following on from feedback. Now you are very welcome to use any User Name you are happy with, so if you have a favourite please feel free to make use of it. Later in the registration process you will be asked for your Real Name so we still know who we are talking to!

Larry, Greg, myself and all the lads on the Arborfield Old Boy's forum look forward to welcoming you to our new home soon.

Kindest Regards,

David (Tich) Schofield 65A



Arborfield Old Boys' Association

AR (Bob) SISSON 57A

Hi again lads

It is with a sad heart I have to inform you all that Bob Sisson passed away at 0300 hours this morning (Thursday 22 Oct 09)

We have been informed by Mike Davis, a close friend of Bob, that the funeral will take place on Wed 28 Oct 09 at 1000 hours. Further details regarding the funeral service, its location and donations will be sent to you later this weekend.

A few of the lads have already decided to attend the funeral and if in line with the family's wishes they intend to lay a wreath on behalf of all 57ers. Donations will be gratefully received for this or to a nominated charity if the family would prefer this. Details will follow.

At the moment our thoughts are with Bob's family and on behalf of all 57ers a sympathy card is being sent to Judy and children today.

Take care.

Roger
Trix


Arborfield Old Boys' Association

Forum connection problems x2

Looks like our hosts are still having problems with their servers. All the forums across the world using them are down today. Can't get on the help-line to see what/when the problem will be sorted, but will keep all informed.

Arborfield Old Boys' Association

National Memorial for all Old Boys.

Update .....

The Army Apprentices Memorial was discussed in great detail at the management meeting held in Arborfield on 13th October. There is now a steering committee with representatives from all 4 schools and they are tasked to come up with designs/costs/logistics/fund raising in time for our AGM, but Gordon Bonner did send in this early sketch following their initial thoughts.

It seems both the RAF and Royal Navy already have their memorials to their 'junior tradesman' so the focus is on developing a stunning memorial worthy of our A/Ts. Gordon can explain it better then I - but the 4 stone benches represent the 4 schools and the centre plaque will say something about the number of apprentices, whilst the main plaque with the school badge will say something about the importance army apprentices have had to the success of the army over the years. Naturally this report is 3rd hand - and our representatives will keep us all informed as to progress. I understand from Gordon the steering committee are meeting up again at some point towards the end of this month.

Lastly Gordon told me he thought the costs might be c£50,000 so we have to come up with a number of fund raising initiatives!




Arborfield Old Boys' Association